Rah Rah Ray, It's A Jungle School Play
2005-05-23, 5:17 p.m.

This morning was Son�s school play. Son does not *do* school plays. He has a reprieve from tonight�s performance�we are having church photos made, which they do only every few years, so he can misbehave for the benefit of the photographer and have it immortalized in the new directory, instead of doing so in front of 300 sweaty parents in the gym.

Daughter and I showed up at 10am. I was already testy. Son�s school is good, but hoity-toity with ubermoms whose idea of casual wear is Li*ly Pul*itzer and they arrive in their Beemers for every stinking event with homemade cookies made in their incredibly large kitchens. I show up in t-shirts and jeans with a package of 0reos and a pail of snark. This time, I didn�t even bring the 0reos.

Last week the school sent home a note that they had already ordered the t-shirts for the play, send in $5 right away. Would it be unreasonable to expect the thing to fit? Son�s solid black t-shirt hung down to his knees and obscured his little black shorts. But that�s not the worst.

The kids wrote their own play. Okeyfine, sure, they kept the dialogue to a bare minimum. Good kids. It was divided into three parts. The last part had kids in Flintstone couture with bad papier mache dinosaurs. The second part had pirates with scruffy eyeliner five o�clock shadows and some rather good sharks. The first part, the bit Son was in, was the big Jungle Adventure. Son and the other kids were out there�with pom poms.

Sparkly green and royal blue pom poms.

They danced in a circle on tiptoes shaking pom poms. And not a big ol� YAY shaking either, they held their hands at waist level and gave a dibbity-dab to the right, a dibbity-dab to the left, hop shuffle circle circle shimmy those shiny pom poms.

I sent five bucks to school so my son could be a pom pom girl in a little black dress.

And someone PLEASE tell me what the hell do pom poms have to do with the jungle? What kind of crack did they have in the teacher�s lounge that day?

After the pep rally routine, they got cardboard animal cutouts and did some sorta-kinda growling and sorta-kinda raking claws in the air which was a little better, but in no way made up for the initial experimental dance routine. I was flabbergasted. I came thisclose to plucking Son off the stage and herding him outside to toss a football or have a farting contest, ANYTHING. A few more seconds with the pom poms and I would have had another daughter. I�m all for �getting in touch with your feminine side� and whatever else floats your boat, but sending my 10-year old boy out for The Powderpuff Jungle Fever Dance Troupe is a bit much.

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